Monday, September 28, 2009

Invited by the OAS, Celso Athayde, General Secretary of CUFA, came to NYC to attend the launching of the Inter-American Social Protection Network on September 22nd. The inaugural section had remarks by the Secretary General of the OAS, Jose Miguel Insulza; Secy of State Hillary Clinton; by the President of Chile Michelle Bachelet; by the President of the IDB Inter-American Development Bank) Luis Alberto Moreno; and by the mayor of NYC Mike Bloomberg. Fabio Azeredo, coordinator of CUFA in the USA accompanied Athayde.

The Network intends to stimulte the exchange of experiences from different countries that can be applied and adapted elsewhere. Madam Clinton and the mayor of NYC both mentioned the experiences with cash trasnfer programs such as developed in Mexico and Brazil that have been successfully adapted to American cities such as NYC.

CUFA was invited for its recognized capilarity while approaching the youth who live in the communities throughout the globe.

About CUFA - USA

CUFA,(Central Única das Favelas) Central Union of the Slums is a product of the union between the youth from various poor communities of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil primarily blacks who searched for space to express their attitudes. It was created with the purpose to allow them the opportunity to share their talents, ideas, social attitudes, and simply their will to live.
CUFA already has international braches where a variety of projects are being developed and implemented in less fortunate and low income communities of many countries around the world.
The CUFA USA is already operating out of many states with the intention to socially mobilize the communities, carrying the principal objective of CUFA to promote activities in the areas of education, recreation, sports, culture, citizenship, graffiti, DJ, break-dancing, rap, audiovisual, street basketball, and literature among others. Besides these there is also promotion, production and distribution of the hip-hop culture through publications, CD’s , videos, radio programs, shows, contests, music festivals, cinema, arts, expositions, debates and seminars.